From There to Here
by Loretto
Summary: Nico's first impressions of Dani, and how they evolved over time. I'm reposting this as I can, so if it looks familiar, it is.
1. The Dossier

When Nico first looked at her background information, he'd put together a profile of her that he hadn't shared. It consisted of the mental notes he'd made, the same kind he did on anyone else.

Married young, to her high school sweetheart. (Nico had found it was important to go back to the high school yearbooks whenever possible. You never knew what you'd find out.) The picture of her and her soon-to-be ex at their senior prom showed a handsome boy and a sweet-faced girl with big brown eyes, whose smile was as sincere as her boyfriend's was phony. Two children, early, then graduate school, then her Ph.D. Strong academic performance. Very recently split from her husband. No money problems, but looking at the spending patterns on the credit cards made it obvious to an old hand like Nico that her husband had been cheating on her for the better part of a decade. The spending patterns shifted abruptly a few months ago. She found out all at once and threw him out. _Good for her_. The thought came to him unbidden, and surprised him for a second.

So in his mind, this woman was emotionally probably pretty vulnerable, which could be problematic if she became entangled with one of the players. She was older than the players but very pretty in a way he didn't care for himself. She didn't have much dating experience (nothing he found suggested that she'd been anything but faithful to her husband), or, to be more accurate, she didn't have any experience. He'd need to watch her closely. A lot of these guys were magnets for troubled women, or maybe they sought them out. (He wasn't the psychologist.) Having a troubled woman in their heads would be disastrous for everyone. Although, when he thought about it, maybe it would be more disastrous for her. When he looked at the current picture of her in the dossier, she still had the same open, genuine smile she had in high school. She looked like a nice, good-hearted person (for as much experience as he had with nice people - nice people rarely had need for his services).

He had his suspicions about her and Matt, and he felt sorry for her. Matt was a good enough guy, and very uncomplicated, but he had a tendency to get involved with the women he worked with, meaning that the good doctor would find herself facing a steady stream of his exes. He also knew that she would find out, like his exes had, that Matt put the team and his career first.

The bottom line, though, was that he suspected that Dr. Santino would be nothing more than a blip on the team's radar. A suburban mom with no knowledge of sports or experience in the business workplace wouldn't last. She was out of her league.


	2. First Impressions

He kept his distance so he could draw some conclusions about how she worked. His first impression was the same he had gotten from her dossier - she seemed like a nice person, but she wasn't going to be able to find a solution for TK if the big guns had already failed. He was slightly impressed, though, at her candor when Coach asked her about her education - he hadn't known she was accepted to better schools (that didn't seem relevant, so he'd made a judgment call about looking into it ), but her reasons for going to Hofstra were neither self-aggrandizing or self-pitying.

She was feisty, but he'd seen a lot of people who talked tough but didn't deliver, so that didn't impress him. Donnally seemed charmed by her, though; if it hadn't already been clear that he had slept with her before, his silly smile around her pretty much spelled it out. Normally Donnally went for willowy All-American types, so the tiny, curvaceous Dr. Santino really was a change in pace for him. TK seemed much less charmed, though. It seemed pretty clear that he had thought that he might add Dr. Santino to his list of conquests and she had shut that down quickly.

She had noticed that he had been doing surveillance on her house after her first meeting with Terrence. He watched as she spotted him and walked over to his car. He wondered to himself how tall she was. It seemed like it would be hard to take someone like that seriously. She was just too...cute. (For once, he didn't mean that as a character defect - he wasn't typically a big fan of cute.) She just was cute, no two ways about it. He wasn't trying to stake out her house, either. It was nothing personal, he just wanted to see how much privacy TK would have during his sessions. She confronted him about it, politely but firmly, saying that these sessions require complete confidentiality, and he had to admit, he had a little bit of fun pointing out to her that her kids seemed to be doing their best to violate that confidentiality. The way the two scurried away when they realized their mother was on to them suggested that she was not a pushover in the parenting department.

She seemed to take her professional responsibilities very seriously, but he was having a hard time getting a read on her work communication style. She didn't hide how she felt about _anything_, it seemed. Her face was incredibly expressive. Was that the way she was in sessions? Therapy was a completely unfamiliar concept to him, by choice, but now he was wondering what it entailed, exactly.

He was wondering how she would handle the unusual hours her job would require, and he realized that if they worked together again, she would probably have some overlap with him in that area: people who find themselves in trouble in the early hours of the morning typically had some sort of emotional response. He woke her up at 3:00 to get her to come to a strip club with him; she objected, but for practical reasons - she was in the middle of a custody battle, and her husband was having her watched - not because she resented doing it. He could handle that particular problem. He found himself enjoying the surprise on her face when she learned they would be taking a helicopter to the strip club.

She seemed to be having no more success with TK than anyone else, unfortunately. He almost felt like he should comfort her when he saw her dejected face after she left the strip club; she must have that effect on people. However, that wasn't his place and it looked like his intersection with Dr. Santino was going to be quite limited.

He was surprised when, the next day, he learned that TK had gotten a ride from a friend to Dr. Dani's son's football game. He was going to confront them, but he was again surprised to see TK get into Dr. Santino's car. The two drove away to Newark, where they ended up at an overgrown graveyard. He assumed it was where TK's mother, who he knew had died in Newark many years ago, was buried. He kept a respectful distance, but he could see that Dr. Santino was comforting TK, who appeared to be quite emotional. He watched them for a long time, impressed. TK seemed calmer, and there was no mistaking the kindness and concern shown by Dr. Santino's body language.

When TK caught the pass that weekend, he was happy for the team, and for Dr. Santino. He honored his promise to shut down the private investigator, which he would have done whether Dr. Santino succeeded or not, of course. He glanced over to where she was laughing with her friend and kids outside of the stadium. She seemed like a good mother, and he was glad she wouldn't have to worry about this jerk.


	3. What She Seemed to Be

He wasn't quite sure which tactics to use on Dr. Santino. She didn't scare easily - he'd seen as much when she stood up to Coach when she'd first started working with TK. He could tell that going straight for the throat by threatening her job wasn't going to be a long-term success. That was fine with him, because using the tactic on this pocket-sized little suburban mother with the big brown eyes made him feel a tiny bit ridiculous, like he was bullying her. He gave up the approach entirely after he suggested to her that her mother was using inside secrets about the Hawks for betting purposes. Her concern and relief when her mother was cleared were so genuine, and she had been so straightforward, that he decided that she could be trusted to be honest and helpful if there were problems in the future. In other words, Dr. Santino was what she appeared to be.

He could expect her to work in good faith. He was relieved to be able to draw that conclusion about someone in the Hawks operation, because most days he didn't know. Admittedly, they all had their own priorities, but he'd seen Coach Purnell put winning over his players' health, and of course the Pittmans were entirely self-serving. Donnelly was kind of a professional Nice Guy, but he seemed pretty self-absorbed and Nico suspected that if push came to shove, Donnelly would look out for his own interests and everyone else would come in a distant second. Dr. Dani, on the other hand, put the best interests of her patients first, always. She'd go after anyone who didn't, including him.

She really was unlike anyone else he worked with, or from most of the people he knew. It was like visiting a different world to go to her house. There were signs of life there. There was always food in the fridge. (One time she offered him some, then seemed to realize it was unprofessional and apologized, saying she was used to feeding people who came to her house. He understood - she was a mom of two teenagers, and they were probably hungry all the time, if he remembered teenagers correctly.) There was a flower garden that was pretty but clearly not professionally done, so he imagined it was her work. It had a little bench out there where he imagined she drank coffee. One time he found a book out there in one of the flower beds - he thought maybe she'd dropped it, but she said she'd thrown it out the window. He was used to keeping his curiosity under control, but he would have enjoyed understanding why she'd done that. It was funny - he would have thought these visits to the suburbs would have been quite tedious, but they were normally quite amusing.


	4. The Donnally Factor

As time progressed, he watched her interact with Matt, and saw the hurt in her eyes when he'd show up at events with other women. She might be attractive and smart and a good student of human nature (and really funny and genuinely caring), but when it came to romance, she was still very young emotionally, and way out of her league. He mused that it was entirely possible that her husband had been her first (and only) serious boyfriend. _Time to cut off that line of thought._ _I'm swimming in some strange waters here_. Still, he'd seen nothing that indicated that she was anything but super-professional with her clients. In fact, he'd marveled at how quickly she asserted her authority when it came to her patients and their well-being. She was the best at what she did, no doubt. It just so happened that this time the best was wrapped up in a small, curvy package that came with bouncy curls, platform wedges and expensive, definitely non-mom jeans. Now that he thought about it, he could definitely see her appeal.

He was starting to really enjoy their back-and-forth. She had this way of setting him off-balance that he hadn't experienced before. Just when he thought he had the upper hand by deflecting her questions, she'd suddenly do something that would suddenly make him react in a way he hadn't expected. He always felt like she was challenging his actions. He knew that not everything he did looked good in the cold harsh light of day, and Dr. Santino didn't have a problem calling him on it. (In fact, she didn't have a problem calling anyone on anything, something he got a huge kick out of when he saw it turned on someone else.)

At the fundraising banquet, when TK got into a fight with a rival player over a girlfriend, he was surprised at how chastened he felt, albeit momentarily, when she called him "out of control" for attempting to buy off the woman who was causing the dissension among teammates. He watched as she quickly broke up the fight and took TK away to read him the riot act (or at least that's what it looked like to him). He noted that the sparkly earrings she was wearing reached her shoulders. It would be distracting to have a conversation with her with those earrings dancing around her head, he imagined. Donnally seemed to be managing earlier - he was somehow managing to flirt with Dr. Santino even while his date was nearby. He didn't normally give Donnally a lot of thought, but recently he'd been wondering why he was considered to be such a good guy.


	5. Taking Care

She was fast becoming one of his favorite people in the workplace. Their jobs paralleled each other, or maybe complemented was the better word. They both solved problems. Like him, she said what she meant and she meant what she said. They both had to keep information close to the vest, for different reasons, of course. He loved that she could be so brilliant and incisive about her clients, but at the same time would get flustered when he called her on things like her tendency to squint when she didn't like someone. _Matt was an idiot not to do whatever it took to keep her_.

After he had seen the success she'd had with other clients, he felt comfortable referring Jason, a friend's son - a gambler whose tell was costing him his career - to her as a client. When he found out that the client was in debt to loan sharks, and that they had come to Dani's house, he was..._perturbed_. He became more perturbed when she said she had no intention of dumping Jason as a client, saying that she was worried about his safety. Without even thinking he shot back, "I'm concerned for YOUR safety." She looked slightly startled at the intensity of the way he said it, as was he, frankly, but she was also clearly touched and grateful. (He was starting to understand why Dr. Santino seemed to have an ever-increasing flock of people she felt responsible for - it didn't take much for her to see someone's merit and care about them. In that way, she was his polar opposite - he had only a few people who fell into that category - people he worried about and protected not because it was his job, but because he just did.) He decided to send Zeno over to keep an eye on things, while he'd look into it on his end. _If she was determined to do this, then he'd just have to make sure the situation got resolved quickly_.

He liked going over to her house, even if it always seems to be in the middle of the night. Sometimes he could tell she was still up, and he wished he could stay around and hang out with her. (He wasn't really the type to hang out, but it seemed different somehow.) Sometimes it was clear she had been asleep, and he was impressed with how cute she was with her tousled hair and flowy pajamas. He'd never met a woman who dressed like that to sleep. Everything seemed to be chosen for softness. _Her bed was probably covered with pillows._


	6. Different Notes

He didn't know if she caused him to loosen his ties to the Pittmans, or if it was easier because she was there, or if it was completely a coincidence. He did know, however, that when Gabrielle Pittman came back into his life, he was far less vulnerable to her charms. She seemed so calculating and self-absorbed and kind of brittle. She wasn't affectionate. There was no softness about her. She was all sharp angles and high fashion and exotic perfume that seemed to linger for days after he saw her. He really preferred something lighter in the cologne department, now that he thought about it. He liked the faint perfume Dr. Dani wore, which was warm, but light. He couldn't really describe it. It smelled like flowers and spice and for some reason it reminded him of cookies (Was he losing his mind here?) Well, now it was going to bother him until he figured out that last element. If she stood just a little closer to him, he could probably figure out. He'd give it a shot.

(By the time he saw a bottle of it on the table by her front door, he'd already figured out the other note was vanilla. The perfume was Chanel, Allure Sensuelle. He was almost disappointed that he had the answer now, because he'd amused himself trying to figure out all of the elements. He did that when he found a wine he really liked, but it was the first time he'd applied those skills to perfume.)


	7. A Friend

By the time he came to her for advice, he could honestly say he trusted her more than anyone else in his life. She was honest, she was caring. She stayed loyal to her code, something he admired and understood. He was a little nervous that their relationship would lose that teasing element he enjoyed so much. He liked startling her, and hearing her surprisingly husky laugh, and of course, she was very easy on the eyes, especially when she looked playfully up at him with those big brown eyes. He didn't want to risk that, but he really needed help. In fact, as she pointed out, what he needed was a friend, and he realized that she was his friend now. That meant a lot to him.

When she asked him if he was still in love with Gabrielle, he didn't answer. The answer was yes, he thought, but her question made him think about what exactly love meant in this case. If it meant carrying a torch for a woman for years, always being there for her, then yes, he was still in love. But if it meant enjoying her company above all others, he wasn't so sure. All other things being equal, he'd probably have more fun talking with Dr. Dani than spending an evening with Gabrielle. _Of course, all other things were most definitely NOT equal._

When he found out Gabrielle had been letting him think that Juliette was his child, his reaction was strange. He knew he should be furious and devastated, but in reality, he was relieved - now he was finally done with her. She wasn't a good person, and she wasn't good for him.


	8. Strangely Awkward

When TK was shot, he was completely taken by surprise when he saw her with Donnelly, and he didn't bother to hide it. Dr. Dani looked embarrassed, but Matt didn't seem to care. They all had more important things on their minds right then, anyway.

Most of the players stopped by, but by the end of the night, it was him, Matt, Dr. Dani and Coach. He found himself absent-mindedly staring at Dr. Dani as she dozed on Matt's shoulder. He hadn't been able to talk to her much while she was waiting, and it felt strange to approach her while she was with Donnally. It was like he was interrupting date night. He guessed that this was one of the drawbacks of having a female friend who wasn't a romantic interest - you had to deal with their boyfriends, and that was going to be awkward. This had never been a problem for him before. _Maybe it was the friend part_. He gave up on this line of thought. His brain wasn't making a lot of sense right now. He was too tired and stressed. When they returned for the new season, he would work with Dr. Dani exactly the same way he had in the past.

* * *

When he saw her six weeks later, he was really happy to see her. He couldn't resist teasing her about Donnally and how she had kept busy during those six weeks. Her squint told him that she didn't like that particular joke much, and her abrupt change of subject told him that this topic was not one they would be discussing regularly. That was fine with him - mentioning it had been one of those weird impulses he sometimes had these days, and he had regretted it as soon as he did.

She didn't know anything about the Pittmans' divorce. Without thinking, he told her to remind him to program her radio with Sports Talk. He realized after he said it that really, wasn't that Donnally's job? He thought slightly scornfully that it probably never occurred to Donnally to help Dani out with that. _Donnally, already falling down on the job_.


	9. Not His Finest Moment

He had assumed that things would be normal with Dr. Santino, but in reality, he hadn't worked with her much after she got back together with Donnally. Donnally in particular was getting on his nerves - he was just so smug all the time - but he wasn't exactly seeking out Dr. Santino, either, since she had it bad for Mr. Good Guy, either, and he suspected it was clouding her judgment. He hadn't had to go to her at home since the night TK was shot - there had been some times when he had considered it, but he assumed that Donnally was there, and he didn't want Donnally to get involved in some of the situations he was dealing with.

He was intrigued when she finally contacted him about a client. He was a little testy with her, but she ignored his irritation. Her request - that she do a full background check on Damon Razor - wasn't out of line, but even though he knew better, he couldn't resist asking her whether she had professional interest in this or if it was because Donnally's career was on the line since Razor was his pick. Even as he said it, he felt foolish, especially the way he said, "your boyfriend" with a slight sneer. _What was he doing?_ Fortunately, she didn't acknowledge the aspersions he was casting on her professionalism. Instead, she pointed out that everyone was feeling the stress around Marshall.

He didn't realize until after she left that she had gotten him to reveal that he was feeling the pressure, too, and that she had managed to cheer him up by providing her Shark Week-garnered advice about bopping sharks in the nose (complete with hand gestures, too). He didn't know whether to be impressed about how well she handled him, or impressed by how ridiculously cute she was throwing imaginary punches at sharks. He settled for the latter. He already knew she was great at people-fixing, and he had really missed the way she could make him laugh.


	10. Romantic Status

When the league investigator, Vera Dade, said that Donnally was being investigated, he decided to check out the trainer's activities himself. He saw a $10,000 charge at a popular jeweler's shop, which was suspicious to him. He couldn't think of a reason why Donnally would be spending so much money at a jewelry shop. Finally it dawned on him - Matt was going to propose to Dr. Santino. He couldn't help himself from asking Donnally. (He wasn't quite sure why, except to shake Matt up a bit - he couldn't stand how smug Matt was around Dr. Dani.) Donnally didn't deny it, and asked him why he cared about his personal life all of a sudden. Of course, he didn't care, but the question irked him a little bit.

It turned out that the league was investigating wiretapping and other issues related to him and Pittman, which was almost a relief to him because he didn't have to look into Matt's romantic life anymore. Also, it was a pleasure to deal with Vera - she was a square dealer, and it was nice to talk shop (or as close as either of them were going to get) with someone. They thought the same way.

It also turned out that Vera wanted _him_. Normally he would steer clear of getting involved (even briefly) with someone like Vera, who could get to all of his professional secrets. It wasn't because he had a problem with dating someone he worked with; it had never been an issue for him, so he hadn't really even thought about the implications until he had to consider the Donnally/Dani situation. In any case, he had had enough of thinking about Donnally and Dani, and Vera was beautiful, smart and sexy. When she kissed him, he responded with equal intensity.

The next morning, it was very pleasant - no angst, no drama. It was fun matching wits against her to see who would get the upper hand in the information-gathering process (he figured it was a draw). He liked Vera, and wouldn't mind seeing more of her from time to time. The evening had been a nice anomaly for both of them.

As he was walking out the door, she commented on the contents of his phone, teasing him about his photos of Onyx. He didn't mind her knowing about his cat; as he pointed out, Onyx was his friend. When she asked him about Dani, on the other hand, he felt himself freezing up a little bit. Yes, there were a lot of calls and texts from her - after all, they worked together closely on a number of things. Rather than pointing that out, he found himself responding that, like Onyx, Dani was also a friend. He wasn't quite sure why he hadn't just set her straight by making it clear she had a work relationship with Dr. Santino, considering that it was the truth.


	11. Disappointment

When he heard that Pittman had managed to bug people's offices, he was disappointed, but not surprised. However, he was surprised at how he reacted when he heard that one of those offices was Dr. Dani's. He knew she'd be devastated – her clients' privacy meant everything to her – and he knew it was his fault. This never should have happened. He owed it to her to tell her, and then. He cut short his evening with Vera, despite what that signified. To her credit, Vera understood - she had made note of his friendship with Dani when they had met before. He was pretty sure Vera thought there was more to it than friendship, which he had brushed off before, but when she asked him if the reason why he was so upset about the breach was specifically because he had disappointed Dani, he admitted it.

For the first time, he didn't look forward to showing up at her door late at night.

He wasn't surprised when she chased him out of the house. He deserved it. He, of all people, understood how she felt when she said her ethics had been compromised.


	12. Realization

He managed to get the tapes, but even as he gave her the copies, he knew it wasn't good enough. She was nearly in tears, and tried to shoo him away, but he took a chance and stayed anyway. He needed her to understand that he would take care of this, that he had never let her down, and never would. At first she didn't look at him, but he had to make sure she could see in his eyes that he meant every word. When she looked at him, and he saw the expression in her eyes – so surprised and touched and trusting – her vulnerability froze him in his tracks. When she leaned towards him for a kiss, he knew he would be taking advantage of her if he accepted it.

It took a lot for him to leave her there crying, but it was the right thing to do. He needed to find Marshall, and he needed to think about why the idea of her kissing him was making his head spin. Yes, she was gorgeous and sexy, but he'd dated a lot of women who met those requirements. The difference was is that in addition to being those things, Dani was sweet, funny, good and touchingly vulnerable at times_._

_She was lovable_.

He couldn't believe it took him so long to realize it. He wondered what she was feeling, but he suspected he was way ahead of her in that area.


	13. Connection

When Marshall died, he brought the original tapes to her. He could have given them to her later, but he needed to see her. He wasn't going to kid himself. He found her sitting outside, holding a fishbowl with her dead fish in it. He could barely tell her what had happened, but when he did, she did just the right thing. She put down the bowl, and she hugged him tight. Even though he was really sad, he savored how amazing it felt.

He was surprised to hear that she didn't think she knew him. She did. She knew everything that was important. This time, when she turned to him for a kiss, he didn't turn away. He waited. He let her meet him halfway – he didn't want her to feel pressured in any way.

The kiss was like nothing he had ever experienced. Words escaped him. And it turned into more kisses, equally intoxicating, but increasingly urgent. He remembered them stumbling upstairs, dizzy from lust and that other feeling, like he'd been hypnotized.

When the phone rang and it was Ray J calling from the police station, he saw her face freeze in terror, and he knew she was dealing with something that had wrenched the moment from them. And it turned out to be pretty bad – the kid had thousands of dollars in pot plants in his car. Ray Jay's dad had called in every favor to keep him out of jail.


	14. Treading Water

After that, she had done everything possible to avoid him. She actually was doing a pretty good job of going to ground, now that he thought of it. He reminded himself to be patient. She had been hurt pretty badly by her husband, and Matt hadn't helped either. He knew she needed time to work through her thoughts. It was funny that someone so in tune with others, so infinitely wise, could barely look at him without blushing sometimes. He realized that when he came to her house and she was lying on the floor. She clearly wasn't ready to deal with it. A few weeks later, he got the message: for the moment, she couldn't deal with the reality of what had happened. He understood. He also knew she was worth waiting for. He couldn't imagine that an experience that…magical…was one-sided. She just wasn't ready to feel something so intense.

Weeks passed with no change. He still felt a charge when she was near him, and their relationship had not returned to that playful banter they used to have. Things were awkward, and he was starting to think that they were going to remain that way, preserved in amber, for eternity. When he got the offer from Cuban, he decided to test the waters. Her dismay that he was leaving was clear, but she couldn't – or wouldn't – define what she felt for him. Her answer – that the team would miss him – first made him happy, since she was clearly talking about herself. Then he realized that they were still just treading water.

He really had it bad, and although he might have managed to pine for Gabrielle for the better part of two decades, he wasn't sure he was going to be able to make it for two more months knowing that Dani was so close, but not his.


	15. Distance

He hadn't expected to see her kissing Matt. It really was too painful to talk about. He needed to get away from this – it would be torture. Dallas suddenly switched from a possibility to a solution. When his plans changed, he threw himself into the new problem, glad to have something to distract him.

Over the months that passed, she called and texted and emailed him, but he never responded. What was the point? She had made her choice, and she didn't choose him. He couldn't let himself hope again. And, if he admitted it, he was angry that she had chosen Matt, who was practically a high school boyfriend himself - he had no depth. _She really was immature_. He felt guilty thinking that because he knew it was unfair. It did make him feel better, though. And besides, he didn't want her anywhere near what he was involved in.

He also couldn't help but wonder if maybe she thought he was still hung up on Gabrielle, or maybe she'd heard about Vera. He NEVER second-guessed himself this way, or spent this kind of time dissecting situations. He didn't like the way it made him feel.

After a while, he'd heard stories from sources inside the Hawks. That shortly after he left, Dani and Matt had clearly broken up for good. A few weeks later, he had heard that Matt and Noelle had eloped and were expecting a baby. To his credit, he didn't feel even a hint of satisfaction. He knew she must be devastated. Sure enough, she disappeared from the Hawks around the time that Coach Parnell was let go, and she only returned to be fired by the world-class jerk who was now running the show. He picked up the phone a few times around then, and came very close to calling her. However, just because she didn't end up with Matt didn't mean that she wanted to be with him. And, to be honest, he didn't like the idea of being someone's second choice again.


	16. A Favor

He shouldn't have been surprised that Connor McLane wanted to meet Dr. Dani. Connor knew everything that was going on in the sports world, and Nico was sure that Dani's successes meant dollar signs to McLane. He didn't want to tip his hand, so he agreed to provide the introduction.

He had always known that he might see her again someday, but he assumed that would be far down the road, not a few months later. Well, he'd just need to keep himself in check. It wasn't that he couldn't control himself around her, it was just that she had a way of taking him by surprise.

When he heard her voice, it took him a second to compose himself. He kept it brusque, even though his heart softened when he heard the genuine worry in her voice. He felt guilty – he'd pushed that part of her personality aside when he thought of her – but all her kindness and caring came rushing back to him. Still it didn't matter. He didn't want her to get anywhere near V3, so she was going to get a cold welcome from him.


	17. Couch

She slapped him. She had seriously slapped him in the face. He hadn't expected that. She had really been worried about him, and she didn't bother to hide how much she cared. Losing sleep over him? Torturing her? She really was guileless. He felt himself warming to her. She might have chosen Donnelly, but he was genuinely important to her. He decided to twist the knife by mentioning what happened with the Hawks - to make it clear that he had known what was going on with her personally and professionally, but that it was none of his concern. Her sneer was unexpected - like she suddenly saw him as a different, lesser person._ It probably served him right that the knife ended up cutting him, too._


	18. Protection

Of course she was able to help the baseball player. She was the best. Watching her from a distance, he admired how she was both authoritative and infinitely kind to the young pitcher. He reminded himself that she had chosen Matt, and that she couldn't be around him, and his resolve returned. He had flirted just the tiniest bit earlier, asking her if she planned to hit him again – now he regretted it. He watched her teeter back to her seat on her ridiculous wedge heels. She certainly hadn't lost any of her allure, that's for sure. He'd be glad when this project was over. She was reminding him how much he missed her.

When the client's case had taken a strange turn, he expected it to be the end of her stay with V3, but she wouldn't give up without a fight. She went full Santino on Troy, telling him she needed all the information on Hutch, or to let her go home and make a lasagna, where no one would be second guessing her. He had to stop himself from smiling at that, and Connor seemed pretty charmed by her, too. Fortunately, Dr. Dani was about a decade older and about a foot shorter than the type of woman Connor dated. He wondered why that was fortunate, exactly. Well, he still cared for Dani, and didn't want to see her getting involved with another immature guy.

They were thrown together on this project, like the old days, except that he really didn't want to help her. She got through to him, though, by reminding him she really cared about this kid, and she was as ferocious on his behalf as she ever had been about any of her other clients. She had no problem calling him out on his lack of professionalism. _Point, Dr. Santino_. He reluctantly agreed to help, and she walked away. Then, before he could stop himself, he was apologizing. She processed it, then responded, "Ditto." How she could make a "ditto" carry so much significance, he couldn't figure out. Or maybe he was just reading into it. Either way, he hoped Dr. Dani's adorable, heart-on-her-sleeve face would be out of his soon. He needed to reign in his ego, too - no more apologies because he couldn't stand her looking at him with so much disappointment and scorn. _She was going to think a lot less of him, and he just had to get used to that. _

He couldn't resist stopping by her house that evening to deliver the news about Hutch, and he was disappointed that he did, because who should he find there but Matt. He read the dynamic between the former lovers, and was fairly satisfied that Dr. Dani, although uncomfortable with her two former suitors in the same room, was not lovesick over Matt anymore. She seemed annoyed at Matt, and that was it. In Matt's case, though, he was a little suspicious. _Hadn't he ever heard of a phone?_ There was no reason for him to be stopping by Dani's house. _No GOOD reason, let's just say_. Nico pointedly mentioned Matt's impending fatherhood, not-so-subtly reminding him that he had no reason to be sniffing around Dani. When he did, he also saw just the faintest hint of a wince on Dani's face. So that had been why they broke up. He got angry at himself for causing her pain – why couldn't he just stay out of it? She wasn't his property.

He locked eyes with Donnally for a minute and didn't look away. _You lost your chance with her. I didn't._ He could have done something to disabuse Donnally of the notion that he had any romantic interest in Dani, but he didn't. Quite the opposite, in fact. He didn't owe Donnally any favors. If he had been a bigger man, maybe he could have had some compassion for Matt - after all, Dani would never be a part of Matt's life now. Matt would never kiss her, he would never be special to her, they would never have that same intimate connection they used to. But Donnally had gotten to hear Dani say she loved him, had woken up next to her, had hugged her whenever he felt like, and he threw that away, so it was hard to feel much sympathy for him.

But he saw something that made him feel hopeful, despite himself. When the two men were in the room, it was clear that her focus was on him.


	19. Chapter 19

The next case they worked together on, for an unstable actress, was a tough one for him. He had missed working with her. Her insight complemented his research. _They made - __**had**__ made -a good team_. Now, though, they spent the 45-minute drive to the set in complete silence. Considering that he was a man who was professionally silent, he was surprised at how uncomfortable that made him. He made the mistake of asking her about it, and she had snapped that there was nothing to say. He shouldn't have said anything, but he was having a hard time being around her. _Now she'd think he missed their conversations_.

After all, he was actively being cruel to her, which, he was glad to see, was making her angry as well as wounded. He felt bad rooting against her, but it was for her own good. A colossal failure would help speed her to the door. He would still do his professional best, but he wasn't going to be encouraging. Unfortunately, his barbs were disregarded. She was a tough one in some ways.

The actress was being troublesome, so he happily brought her over to Dani's. Hopefully it would be an inconvenience. Dani did look put out, but she stepped up and comforted the distraught girl who had thrown herself in Dani's arms. She was clearly concerned about this girl and her relationship with this Lars guy.

Then it happened.

The actress, gushing about her latest love, said, "Haven't you ever had that feeling, Dr. Santino, where you have something with another person and you can't describe it but it's undeniable? And you had to act on it or you'd just… burst."

She looked at him. And he looked at her. His stomach lurched, and for a moment he was concerned that his feelings were too obvious. And then they both looked away. It was so quick. But it was out there. Even the actress in her massive cloud of self-absorption caught that there was something going on.

Whatever they had between them wasn't entirely in the past for her.

He tried to recover. He was downright cold to her when he told her she could interpret his desire not to work with her any way she wanted, making it clear that he had no interest. For the first time, he saw a flash of hurt in her eyes. She rallied, but he knew he couldn't do that to her again. And he also knew she wasn't going anywhere. She was back in his life.

* * *

He sat in his car outside her house for a few minutes while he attempted to clear his head. He ended up getting two things from this process. The first was that he was still madly, wildly in love with her. The second is that he wasn't going to give up this time. He wanted to be in her life, and he wanted her to be in his. He needed a plan.

He worked it out fairly quickly once he saw the end game. He needed to get what he needed on V3 and get out. Then he would see if he could get Dr. Dani to admit her feelings for him. He didn't know how long it would take for him to get the information, and he had to undo some of the damage he had done to his relationship with Dani while he was waiting. And he had to undo it without drawing attention from others.

By the time he returned to her house with the information on the boyfriend, things were different, at least professionally. He didn't feel the edge he did before. When she said, "Oh, no" at the news he provided, he didn't miss a beat. "Oh, yes. Our friend Buttons is a stalker." _Our_. They were back in sync.


End file.
